Chapter 550

The effects of war were extremely obvious, at least by the time Zhang Zhao had thoroughly defeated the great army of the Southern Tang at Mengzhu Marsh and had just returned his forces to beneath the walls of Songzhou.

The officials and representatives of the local powerful families from Chen, Bo, and Su — the three prefectures south of Xuzhou and Songzhou — had already arrived.

That they could appear so quickly proved only one thing: these local bosses had long been waiting, waiting for the outcome of the war between Zhou and the Southern Tang.

Zhang Zhao felt no particular displeasure; he merely extorted fifty thousand shi of grain and twenty thousand bundles of fodder from these great local clans, and then forgave them.

He even recruited several dozen men from among the sons and nephews of these local magnates to replenish the Left and Right Dragon Guard.

For these great clans living between Zhang Zhou and the Southern Tang, it was only natural to help whoever won.

Most of them did not even care who won; all they sought was to keep their lives and their fields safe and secure.

Had it been the historical Guo Rong here, with his temperament, these wavering local clans would not have gotten off lightly. But Zhang Zhao was different; he could understand how hard life was for these border people.

Moreover, Zhang Zhao did not think that, between him and a pampered young lord like Li Jing, anyone would be foolish enough to choose Li Jing.

Even toward the prefects of these three prefectures, Zhang Zhao only demanded that they atone for their crimes by merit: quickly compile the land, population, and household registers of the three prefectures, pay up the taxes that had fallen into arrears the previous year, and then hand over a sum of atonement silver as a fine.

This was because, after the founding of the Later Jin, control over these prefectures and counties near the Southern Tang had been extremely weak.

All Shi Jingtang sought was to have taxes delivered as quickly as possible, scraping together enough money and grain to satisfy his Khitan father, and his attention was focused on the northern garrisons.

At that time, the Southern Tang was still under Li Bian's rule, and the atmosphere of the Southern Tang court was not as frivolous as it was now, with everyone so fond of fine-sounding words.

Li Bian was a man of humble origins, skilled in both letters and arms, and absolutely deserved to be counted as an outstanding ruler of his generation.

Under his governance, the Southern Tang was politically stable and all trades flourished, and it held enormous attraction for the prefectures north of the Huai River.

Although Li Bian knew the might of the northern cavalry and never dared to provoke the Central Plains dynasties too much, his infiltration ran very deep.

It was from this time onward that the prefectures north of the Huai, except for Xuzhou and Songzhou, which remained under the control of the Central Plains court, all fell into a kind of Schrodinger's state.

When the Central Plains court did not investigate them, the local great clans colluded with the Southern Tang, profiting from trade with the Southern Tang on one hand while passing intelligence to it on the other — this was basically the norm.

It was precisely with this in mind that Zhang Zhao kept his main army from crossing the Bian River, operating mostly in the area from Songzhou to Shanfu, so as to keep these fence-sitters from learning the exact situation.

If even the local magnates of Chen, Bo, and Su knew the outcome, then the people of Songzhou, who were not far from Mengzhu Marsh, naturally knew the outcome even more clearly.

As soon as Zhang Zhao's great army returned, these people ran to a spot not far from Songzhou's walls, crying and shouting for their children and grandchildren, telling their relatives inside the city to resist no longer.

Zhang Zhao also took the opportunity to have a great number of Southern Tang banners — especially the red banner and ochre-yellow yabing guards standard that Li Jing had bestowed upon Liu Yanzhen — paraded ostentatiously beneath the walls of Songzhou by the Savage Bear. After that, the morale inside the city immediately neared collapse.

That night, Du Chongwei sent a man down the wall on a rope to ask for surrender. Zhang Zhao did not even meet the man; he had him cut down with a single stroke, then had the head hurled back into Songzhou by catapult.

At the yin hour, the mid- and high-ranking officers of the Guide Army infantry, including the Chief Supervisor of the Infantry, jointly sent the Songzhou administrative assistant down the wall on a rope to seek out Zhang Zhao and beg for their lives. Zhang Zhao considered it again and again, and still did not agree.

Although he was now anxious to take Songzhou quickly and then hurry off to retake Xuzhou, the soldiers of the Guide Army were special, because most of them had followed the previous Military Governor Song Yanjun and played a disgraceful role on the banks of the Hutuo River.

At that time, it was by relying on two hundred armored troops of the Guide Army that Du Chongwei had first seized control of the various military governors, and then coerced the other Later Jin soldiers into surrendering.

They were guilty. Others could be pardoned, but if the entire Guide Army could escape punishment without shedding a layer of skin, then could Li Shouzhen and his son, and Song Yanjun, who were in the great prison, also be spared death?

Having been refused surrender twice in a row by Zhang Zhao, the entire Guide Army finally understood that Zhang Zhao wanted their lives, and could only shrink back and defend to the death.

At the end of the third month, the great army stormed the outer city. The entire Guide Army and the Khitans withdrew together into the inner city. Zhang Zhao had men set up Fuyuan crossbows and large wooden single-bow crossbows north and south of the city, sealing off the routes by which the Guide Army soldiers drew water.

After two days of thirst, the entire Guide Army could hold out no longer. On the twenty-fourth day of the third month, fighting broke out within the city.

A group of Guide Army soldiers killed all of the more than two hundred remaining Khitans in the city, then opened the west gate of the inner city and surrendered.

Although they knew surrender meant death, they truly could not endure any longer. Drinking horse blood every day to quench their thirst, they wished they could just kill themselves after each drink.

They killed all the Khitans in the hope that this pledge of loyalty might let them escape death by luck.

Zhang Zhao looked at a Guide Army captain with a gaunt face and blood all over his body, holding up the head of Yelu Dilu, and estimated that only a few hundred Guide Army soldiers were still alive. He nodded and agreed to pardon them.

After the great army entered the inner city, the only place where fighting remained was the Guide Army headquarters. Defending it were the yabing guards whom Du Chongwei had raised with his entire fortune.

They would not surrender, and Zhang Zhao would not spare a single one of them.

Because these yabing guards were the several hundred Heyang yabing guards raised by Yang Guangyuan and his son back when they ran amok killing people in Luoyang.

After Yang Guangyuan and Du Chongwei exchanged garrisons, these yabing guards had followed Du Chongwei.

These Heyang yabing guards had done every evil imaginable in Luoyang, and after coming under Du Chongwei's command they became even more utterly devoid of conscience. Zhang Zhao could pardon anyone, but not them.

The Guide Army headquarters, however, was built very solidly, which was also a characteristic of the Five Dynasties: a Military Governor's headquarters was generally built like a damn castle.

Zhang Zhao thought it over and prepared to use fire attack. Won't come out, will you? If you won't come out, then I'll roast your whole family into pigs.

But before the operation could begin, with a "thud," Gao Xingzhou and his son Gao Huaide knelt before Zhang Zhao and pleaded repeatedly.

Only then did Zhang Zhao remember that Gao Xingzhou had married his daughter to Du Chongwei's son Du Hongzhang. If he set a fire, wouldn't Gao E'niang be roasted alive too?

Ah! How pitiful are the hearts of parents everywhere!

Zhang Zhao thought for a moment and agreed to Gao Xingzhou's plea. But since it was you who wanted to save your daughter, then only the old retainers of the Gao family could be used. Zhang Zhao would not throw his own soldiers into this pit.

"I beg the Sage to grant us a squad of the Gold-Splitting Capital's thunder grenadiers!"

Gao Huaide knew what he was about. He knew that the Gold-Splitting Capital under Zhang Zhao specialized in demolition. The Guide Army headquarters was extremely sturdy; if they did not blast down a section of it, who knew how many men would have to die before they could storm in.

Huangfu Chong, who had been at Zhang Zhao's side all along, also brought a squad of the Huangfu family's young men and the former personal followers of Huangfu Yu, including Du Zhimin, the loyal follower whom Huangfu Yu had rescued from the enemy ranks.

"Sage, please allow my Huangfu family's young men to join the assault. The villain Du Chongwei has brought calamity to the nation and the people, and drove my uncle, Grand Preceptor Huangfu, to die in despair for his country. I wish to take the heads of Du Chongwei and his son to offer at my uncle's grave."

"Granted!" Zhang Zhao nodded in agreement, then after a moment's thought waved a hand at Dunzhu beside him.

"Bring the Fifth Squad's divine-arm crossbowmen as well. Clear out the remaining enemies as quickly as possible."

After watching Gao Xingzhou and his son, Dunzhu, Huangfu Chong, and the others begin their assault, Zhang Zhao listened to reports from outside the headquarters.

Liu Yanzhen had brought thirty thousand Southern Tang imperial guards, fifteen thousand prefectural and county troops and local militia, plus twenty thousand Southern Tang laborers and ten thousand Xuzhou laborers — seventy-five thousand men in all — to lift the siege of Songzhou.

But on the road, because of brutal exploitation, thirty thousand laborers had died, been wounded, or fled, until fewer than twenty thousand remained. Therefore, only about sixty thousand men actually entered Songzhou territory.

In the battle, Zhang Zhao first struck and killed the Southern Tang rear army. The rear army's overall commander Zhang Yanwei died in battle, and the laborers and local militia had basically all fled before the fighting even began.

Several thousand more were absent because they were needed to transport grain and fodder to Songzhou and keep the Bian River route open. Therefore, the Southern Tang rear army actually numbered only twenty-seven or twenty-eight thousand men.

Of these twenty-some thousand, most had jumped into the river themselves and were then shot dead or drowned.

Exactly how many died cannot yet be counted; it is estimated to be no fewer than ten thousand.

Of those who did not jump into the river, more than four thousand were cut down in battle, and nearly ten thousand were taken prisoner.

At the Battle of Mengzhu Marsh, the results were even more glorious: of the twenty-one thousand elite Southern Tang imperial guards, more than five thousand were cut down in battle, and the rest were basically all taken prisoner.

Liu Yanzhen, Chief Deployer of the Southern Tang's Northern Marching Camp, and dozens of officers below him, including Zhang Quanyue, Commander of the Cavalry and Infantry and Prefect of Chizhou, died in battle.

Chai Kehong, Chief Inspector of the Dragon Martial Army, and other officers were captured alive; Zheng Zhaoye, Chief Inspector of the Divine Martial Army, was gravely wounded and taken prisoner.

In this single engagement, the Southern Tang's imperial guard suffered heavy losses — and of its most elite twenty thousand men, no less. By the estimates of contemporaries, the Southern Tang's imperial guard numbered at most fifty to seventy thousand.

It can be said that Liu Yanzhen's catastrophic defeat essentially hollowed out all of the Southern Tang's mobile forces.

If Li Jing wanted to organize another thirty thousand men to march north like this, he would have to leave both his eastern and western capitals completely unguarded.

As for the Black Cloud Longsword Capital that appeared at the very end, Zhang Zhao also learned something about it through the prisoners.

It turned out that after Yang Xingmi's death, his successor Yang Wo wanted to free himself from the control of the Black Cloud Longsword Capital, which by then had been split into the Left Fang Army and the Right Fang Army. Within three years of taking the throne, he had expelled a large portion of the Black Cloud Longsword Capital's members.

Thereupon Zhang Hao, Commander of the Left Fang, and Xu Wen, Commander of the Right Fang, rose in rebellion and murdered Yang Wo. But only nine days later, Xu Wen turned against Zhang Hao in an internal struggle, and in the end Xu Wen succeeded in killing Zhang Hao.

However, when Xu Wen killed Zhang Hao, in order to clear himself of suspicion, he revealed all the details of Yang Wo's murder.

He also shifted the entire blame onto Zhang Hao and the Left Fang Army, dragging in a great number of people in the process.

This indirectly led to infighting within the Black Cloud Longsword Capital. By the time the Southern Tang was established, although less than ten years had passed, the Black Cloud Longsword Capital that had once followed Yang Xingmi across the Jianghuai region had essentially vanished, with even its training techniques and tactics lost without a successor.

Within the Southern Tang's imperial guard, only the small remnant that appeared this time remained from those days. Once Zhang Zhao killed them, the descendants of the Black Cloud Longsword Capital still existed, but the true Black Cloud Longsword Capital had been utterly extinguished.

Just as Zhang Zhao was listening to the report, the fighting at the Guide Army headquarters quickly came to an end.

The Gold-Splitting Capital had blasted four large breaches in the eastern and northern sides, and the Zhou army attacked from four directions simultaneously.

Gao Xingzhou and his son Gao Huaide fought with exceptional vigor in order to clear themselves of suspicion.

Huangfu Chong and Du Zhimin and the others needed no mention — Du Chongwei could be said to have indirectly caused Huangfu Yu's death, so they fought without regard for their own lives.

The Mountain-Shaking Capital armored soldiers personally led by Dunzhu, wearing heavy armor and using divine-arm crossbows to pick off enemies house by house and room by room, were more than Du Chongwei's yabing guards could withstand.

In barely two hours, the last two hundred or so former Heyang yabing guards were completely wiped out.

Du Chongwei, along with his wife Lady Shi, his eldest son Du Hongzhang, and his second son Du Hongcan, were searched out and found.

It had been barely two years since he knelt in surrender at the Hutuo River, yet Du Chongwei already looked as though he had aged twenty years.

Back then he had wanted to become a puppet emperor, only to be toyed with by Yelu Deguang. In these two years, not only had his reputation become loathed by gods and men alike, but even the fortune he had amassed was completely squandered.

The gray-bearded Du Chongwei raised his head to look at Zhang Zhao. He had meant to beg for mercy, but one look at Zhang Zhao's eyes told him it was hopeless.

Moreover, those surrounding him were mostly Later Jin soldiers and officers — men whom Du Chongwei had grievously wronged.

"Shameless traitor! So you too have your day! We beg the Sage to give the order — hand this wretch over to us!"

Wang Zhou's eyes had gone red as he looked pleadingly at Zhang Zhao.

A tidal wave of furious curses erupted, and everyone around half-knelt, begging Zhang Zhao to hand Du Chongwei over to them.

Zhang Zhao curled his lip in disgust, unwilling even to glance at this heavyweight plague lord. The moment he waved his hand, Wang Zhou, Yao Yuanfu, and the others dragged Du Chongwei out toward the street.

They had dragged him only a few steps when Zhang Zhao heard Du Chongwei's screams. The soldiers and officers around all surged forward, fists and feet raining down until Du Chongwei's bones were broken and his tendons snapped.

It seemed this man was going to be beaten into a pulp of flesh, just like his fine partner Zhang Yanwei.

Du Chongwei's wife, Lady Shi, was so terrified that she let out a piercing shriek.

This woman was a heavyweight too. Her brother Shi Jingtang and her husband Du Chongwei were each more shameless than the other, and Lady Shi not only failed to remonstrate with them — she was one of their accomplices.

Du Chongwei's ambition to become a puppet emperor was, in fact, largely the result of constant encouragement from Lady Shi, who wanted to become an empress.

Historically, when Yelu Deguang returned north, this couple had knelt and kowtowed to him in Xiangzhou, serving Yelu Deguang as a father.

Still, Zhang Zhao did not intend to kill her. After all, the role she could play was at most a supporting one. He would simply toss her into a nunnery and let her live or die on her own.

But at that moment, Lady Shi's shrieking caught the attention of Xue Huairang, who stood beside Zhang Zhao.

Xue Huairang, who had arrived too late to get a piece of the killing of Du Chongwei, stepped forward with reddened eyes and knocked Lady Shi to the ground with a single punch.

Then a flurry of cudgel blows sent Lady Shi rolling across the ground, and before long she stopped breathing.

Zhang Zhao had meant to stop him, but he hesitated a moment, and by then Xue Huairang had already beaten Lady Shi to death — so he simply let the matter drop.

On the other side, Du Chongwei's two sons, seeing both their parents killed, had collapsed to the ground in terror. Huangfu Chong hurriedly threw himself forward and pleaded with Zhang Zhao, "Sage, please allow your servant to avenge my uncle!"

Hmm — if he didn't come forward and plead now, there wouldn't even be any scraps left for him.

Zhang Zhao gave a faint nod. Huangfu Chong, clutching a mace, pounced forward and smashed Du Hongzhang's skull open with a single blow, then dragged Du Hongcan off into the distance to cut open his belly and carve out his heart as an offering to Huangfu Yu.

With that, the direct line of the Du family had been completely wiped out. Fortunately, Du Chongwei had no grandsons yet, so Zhang Zhao was spared any awkwardness. What remained were Du Chongwei's wives, concubines, and daughters-in-law.

Following Gao Huaide's worried gaze, Zhang Zhao saw a young woman in coarse hemp clothing, her face smeared with yellow mud into a painted mask, yet with bright, shining eyes, mingling in the crowd.

Zhang Zhao immediately knew who this was — it had to be Gao Huaide's younger sister, Gao Xingzhou's eldest daughter, and Du Chongwei's eldest daughter-in-law, Gao E'niang.

"E'niang is still in the crowd. Grand Guardian Gao, Cangyong — why haven't you taken her away? The weather is cold; don't let her freeze."

Although Zhang Zhao was quite satisfied with the Gao father and son's conduct, he still put on an air of reproach.

Gao Xingzhou and Gao Huaide dropped to one knee. Gao Xingzhou answered in a tearful voice, "Your servant is kin by marriage to a criminal. How dare I put private concerns before public duty?"

Zhang Zhao waved his hand in reassurance. "You can know a man's face but not his heart. Du Chongwei harbored treachery in secret and was shameless beyond measure — how could the Grand Guardian have known? No blame attaches to the unknowing. Rise! And call E'niang over; don't frighten her."

A thought stirred in Zhang Zhao's mind. The Later Jin had originally possessed three pillar military houses in Hebei: Fu Yanqing's Fu family, Gao Xingzhou's Gao family, and Huangfu Yu's Huangfu family.

Now Huangfu Yu had taken his own life for the nation, and the Huangfu family had no successor — it was on the verge of decline. Only the Fu and Gao families remained formidable.

He had already taken Fu Yanqing's eldest daughter — the future Empress Fu of history — as his consort, and with the Fu family producing so many talented generals, it looked as though they would completely overshadow the Gao family.

For a sovereign, that was not necessarily a good thing. Even if Fu Yanqing was loyal, what of the other members of the Fu family? What of his sons and grandsons? So he still needed to lend the Gao family a hand.

Besides, Gao Huaide had historically been a founding meritorious official of the Northern Song and a renowned general of his age — he was qualified for Zhang Zhao to win over.

When Zhang Zhao said he wanted Gao E'niang brought over, Gao Huaide understood instantly. He hurried over, first tore off a piece of cloth to wipe the mud from Gao E'niang's face, then dragged her back.

But when she was made to bow before Zhang Zhao, a stubborn look appeared on Gao E'niang's face, and she refused to lower her head. Only when Gao Huaide forcibly pressed down on her neck was she compelled to bow.

Heh! Zhang Zhao chuckled inwardly. Gao E'niang was quite tall — around one meter seventy or more — the tallest woman he had encountered since arriving in this era.

Her features were not especially gorgeous, but that stubborn expression and defiant look gave her quite the air of a little chili pepper. Rather interesting.

Zhang Zhao laughed heartily, without the slightest reserve. "No need to force her. Send her back to the Eastern Capital first, to keep Lady Fu company!"

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